


lit you up like a star

by powerfulsound



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Fluff and Humor, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Ragnarok, Spoilers, Valkyrie/Bruce Banner
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-10
Updated: 2017-11-10
Packaged: 2019-01-31 11:31:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12681012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/powerfulsound/pseuds/powerfulsound
Summary: “Where else can we go?” Thor murmurs.Loki twists his mouth, and it promises a blade, but he’s not sure whose throat he’s holding it to.“Jotunheim.”





	1. now it's found us

  
“We need somewhere other than Midgard first,” He tells his brother in lowered tones. Thor nods, and closes his eye.

 

In that moment, Loki realises that Thor has truly become the Allfather, carrying the weariness of their people upon his own shoulders, trading his brilliant red cloak for this one of grief and sorrow. The Asgardians have grown restless, the sterile environment so at odds with their usual opulence that it has shown in the form of curved shoulders and restless murmuring. _You fools,_ Loki wants to snarl at them. _How much more of him will you want-_

Their original choice of Vanaheim is not an option. Asgard has nothing to offer to the Vanir, nothing they might want. To go there would simply be to seek aid, and that is something that sits ill in Loki’s stomach, when he thinks about golden Thor bending his head to someone else, humbling himself to frivolous and mocking Freyja and Freyr that Loki exiled-

 

There is one other option. 

 

“Where else can we go?” Thor murmurs. He will not ask it of Loki, would rather lower his pride if it meant protecting Loki’s and this is why Loki _cannot give him up._

 

Everyone remains quiet, even Banner, that senses the tension even if he cannot guess the reason for it. 

 

Loki twists his mouth, and it promises a blade, but he’s not sure whose throat he’s holding it to. The silence stretches.

 

“ _Jotunheim._ ”

 

X

 

Again, and again, Loki does not learn. 

 

Lashes himself to the heavy burden of Thor’s love, subjecting himself to the flaying of his careless cruelty. This isn’t how the story is supposed to go. Loki has had it all planned out, he will remain as himself, too fast and too vicious for slow and kind Thor, dancing just out of reach so that Thor can chase him across universes and lifetimes-

 

But now Thor can no longer chase him, not when his people need him.

 

So Loki stays.

 

+

 

Thor missed dinner.

 

Valkyrie rolled her eyes and Korg shrugged. Banner exchanged a look with Loki, and Loki stood up, excusing himself from the hall, before giving his own portion to the young ones while bring Thor’s portion with him. 

 

Thor never misses meals. Even when as a child when he got punished, or was chastised, he would hole up and eat his feelings away, crying petulant tears at his wronged situation. 

 

Loki returns to Thor’s room, and even the proclamation of “LOCKED” has yet to deter him, if only give him pause. He phases through.

 

“Brother.”

 

There’s an unnatural silence in the room, as though its sole occupant forced it into echoing the soundlessness of the space before them. A line of painful tension has drawn Thor’s shoulders tight, his head buried in his hands. 

 

At once, Loki knew what Thor had been doing. 

 

“Oh, _Thor._ ” In just a few strides, he tosses Thor’s meal onto the table and crosses the room, and pulls Thor into his arms, letting him wrap strong arms around Loki’s waist. Thor makes a keening sound and clutches at him, a drowning man that does not even care if Loki is the siren that would cause his watery demise, and Loki should feel triumph, but it’s grief. Grief that hooks into Loki’s chest, and it is not his own, but it pulls all the same, because Loki has always been weak for Thor’s tears, bound to trigger his own even as children.

 

“A moment.” Thor’s voice is choked. “I will be done in a moment.” 

 

“You fool,” Loki murmurs, but strokes the fuzz of Thor’s hair. “Why didn’t you say something?”

 

“It is not your burden to bear,” Thor mumbles to Loki’s sternum. 

 

Loki pinches him, and Thor is supposed to yelp, except he does nothing but remain as he is, faint tremors travelling against his large frame. Feeling completely out of his own depth, he reaches for Thor’s words instead. “It’s mine, because it’s yours, and I will share it if you let me.”

 

Thor laughs, a poor imitation of his usual boom, before it drags on something raw and wet. Then, Thor starts to shake in Loki’s arms, a low keening sound that raises all the hair of Loki’s skin, and his own diaphragm lurch with the threat of tears, Thor’s grief echoing in the empty cavern of his chest. Hela has struck Thor, where it would hurt the most, ripped Thor’s family and friends away from him, and if that wasn’t enough, Thor had to burn his entire home to stop her. And Loki knows that Thor hid himself away from everyone not so that he did not appear weak, but because he had no option but to be strong, to be their shining beacon of hope, when their people still remains perched on the precipice of despair.

 

He presses his lips to the crown of Thor’s head, lets him hold him tighter, until it became hard to breathe. Loki will bear witness to this, the same way he had allowed Thor to see how losing Frigga had broken him all those years ago. “I see you, brother.”

 

“I’ve lost everyone now, Loki.” Thor finally quietens, except for the wet sounds of his breathing and Thor speaks the truth, because when Thor thinks of home, he thinks of Asgard, of their proud father and smiling mother, of his friends, the Warriors Three and Sif and of all the people who hailed him as he walked through the streets, calling out to Thor. “I destroyed our home.”

 

Asgard had not been a home for Loki. When Loki thinks of home, he thinks of Frigga, and he has had time to breathe through his grief, to keep away the precious memories he had for her, fold her away between the pages of beloved spell books and the quiet space between dreams and reality, where he could look upon her room and no longer feel the need to burn all of the worlds to the ground with her loss, or to lie down in that same space where she bled to death, thinking that Loki did not love her.

 

The other half of his home is here. He doesn’t offer any niceties, any of his sweet candied words of nonsensical promise to ease the edge of Thor’s grief, because to do anything but acknowledge it would be an insult to them. Thor exhales out, a rattling animal sound in his throat. “All those years, I wanted to be King, that I wanted to raze Jotunheim to prove myself. And now that I am King, it becomes a burden too heavy to pay.”

 

Loki senses that there is something more and so he waits as Thor tries to find his words. “If I lose you too…”

 

“Am I not here?”

 

“I know you took the Tessaract.” Thor says. Loki freezes, but Thor does nothing but press closer, hiding his face. “If it takes control of you again… I… ”

 

Loki remembers the way his mind, already ravaged and left susceptible by the Other, and how the Tesseract had slipped in the fractures and how it took forever to find the pieces of himself it scattered, how it took a blow that would devastate him more than this violation, a loss so devastating to pull him back from the brink of eternal madness.

 

“Thor, I will,” Loki tests the words, refusing to allow the inevitable trembles to even surface, and it’s helped by the reassuring warmth of Thor’s body against his. “Allow you to look into my most treasured memory.” 

 

He presses his hand onto Thor’s temple, and allows him this, because Thor is the only person who he would ever willingly allow into his mind.

 

X

 

_Thor giggles. “Loki, here!” And the space is only big enough for one, but there’s enough space for Loki to fit in scrawny clumsy limbs against Thor’s chubby ones until Loki’s all pressed up against Thor. They giggle, and then attempt to hush each other as footsteps draw closer. Thor’s heart beats underneath Loki’s ear, fast paced and irregular with excitement._

_“My boys,” Frigga calls out, her voice laughing and sweet. Loki lurches, because it’s his mother, and he loves her dearly, with all the adoration his four-year-old heart could muster in that body of his, but Thor giggles and tightens the grip around him._

_“Did you find them?” Comes Odin’s voice, barely hiding a laugh._

_“No,” Frigga says. “But I will soon.”_

_“Watch out for Thor,” Odin comments, sagely. “He bites.”_

_“You, perhaps.” Frigga replies, amused. “But never me.”_

_No, never, Frigga, who remains until now, the beloved memory of home, of all that is good in Asgard for both of them, golden and true._

_Loki, who at this point, has yet to spend more than half an hour away from being carried, starts to grow impatient from not being showered with affection. Thor makes up for it by pressing his mouth hastily to Loki’s cheek, earning himself a soft giggle and a returned kiss._

_“My sons,” Odin rumbles, and lifts the curtain underneath the cabinet to reveal his children._

_Loki upon seeing him screams, and Thor follows suit, before trying to carry Loki on his way out only to be caught by Odin, who swings them both up into his arms. He rubs his chin and lips on them, earning himself loud squeals of delight. Fridge laughs, and she chooses Loki to carry. Loki, who has just started to become conscious of the gap between Loki and Thor, feels his heart swells in size._

_Odin gives her a kiss, and Thor ews, which Loki obediently echoes after, so Thor grins and holds out his hand for Loki to hold._

_“My sons,” Odin says again, and it sounds like pride._

_“My boys,” Frigga continues, and it sounds like love._

X

 

Thor’s eyes are wet when he leaves the space of Loki’s mind, tendrils of Loki’s consciousness clinging to Thor, as reluctant to part as Loki himself, who would want to carry Thor with him where Loki would keep him safe and for his own, where the world would never touch him. 

 

He must share it with Thor, who laughs weakly, and presses their forehead together. “Oh, Loki.” 

 

He says Loki’s name like a benediction.

 

“If the Tesseract makes you doubt me, only seek for this.” Loki murmurs, bringing Thor’s hand to his face. “Ask me to show you this, and this is the one thing I will never deny you. The Tesseract doesn’t know this, they cannot touch this.” 

_Because even I have not allowed myself this, for so long._ Only now, when the pain has at last started to fade, and the madness in Loki’s head started to clear, the sickness in his heart started to dissipate, did it finally become clear.

_"Thank you.”_ Thor says, softly, in between gentle kisses. _Thank you for showing it to me._

 

“You’re a sentimental fool.” Loki says, and kisses back.

 

X

 

“Is that what we’re calling that now? Consorts instead of bitches?” Byleistr says as he leers at Loki within five minutes of meeting. “Tell me Odinson, how does it feel like to be fucked by your elder brother?”

 

_This is such an auspicious start._ Loki keeps his calm only by imaging the give of Byleistr’s soft flesh underneath his knife.

 

“Sometimes,” Thor says, mildly. “He fucks me too.”

 

“Will you please _shut up_.” Loki swears, glaring at Thor despite the warm glow of pleasure in his chest. Someone has to remain the voice of reason.

 

“I do apologise,” Helblindi comments dryly, giving Byleistr a quelling look. The ice crown he wears, glistening and proud must be good for something, because Byleistr subsides, leaving the room. “Byleistr was often dropped on his head as a child.”

 

Thor startles, and then for some unknown reason drops off into silence. Something tells Loki Helbindi is the one to watch out for, and he shifts, just to feel the reassuring weight of his blade on his back.

 

Loki gives Thor a glance, and he seems distracted, but willing to behave himself. If Helbindi notices his staring, he does not say anything. Then, as he is about to approach the topic of trade once more, he realises what that quickening of Thor’s heart means, that slight part to his mouth, well versed in all things Thor.

 

Anger, and another ugly feeling blooms inside him like a poisoned flower. “Excuse me,” He says instead, not even caring if it comes out curt as he drags Thor to aside, rage nearly robbing his tongue as he barely remembers to switch to the Vanaheim tongue to ensure that Helbindi doesn’t eavesdrop.

 

“I don’t believe you -”

 

Thor doesn’t even deny it and just crosses his arms defensively. “It took me by surprise!”

 

“ _Your lust_ ,” Loki hisses. “ _Took you by surprise._ Is it incest that does it for you? Then, can I remind you that they are _not your brothers._ “ _You only have the one, and that insane sister-_

 

Thor flushes, red to his ears and mumbles something.

 

“Don’t mumble, it’s unbecoming of the King of Asgard.” _As is cheating,_ Loki thinks, furious-

 

“You have the same mark there, on your hip in your Jotun form!” Thor blurts out, then ducks his head away. “I spent all of last night staring at it while you fucked me, and it was right there in my face-“

 

Loki stares. Thor shuffles his feet.

 

“It marks us as kin,” Helbindi continues after a long period of silence, in the same bland manner in heavily accented but nonetheless understandable Vanaheim tongue. “Byleistr has it too.”

 

Thor looks ready to die.

_Helblindi is the dangerous one._

 

“King Helbindi,” Valkyrie purrs, eyeing up and down Helbindi. “Banner’s pursuing an eight doctorate in alien anthropology, and I just volunteered as his assistant.” She forges on blithely, ignoring Banner’s horrified look. “We would love to explore your kin marking further.” 

 

“As flattered as I might be,” Helbindi says, tilting his head like a one of Midgard’s birds. “It still does not answer the question of what Asgard has to trade for sanctuary.”

 

Thor looks to Loki and nods.

 

Loki takes a deep breath, and tastes it, the winter air, sharp and leaving a lingering tang that spreads to the cold inside of him, a harmonious bell that has been struck in resonance. The magic of Jotunheim reverberates through his bones in the joy of its anticipation, lifting his hair, and forming frost upon his clothes, edging out the slightest tinge of blue. Thor takes his hand, warm and calloused and Loki can see it, almost as clear as though he was given the sight of the _hags_ that in this has always been _meant to be, a gift from Jotunheim. Thor will forge peace across the realms, a torrential storm that will wash away old prejudices that have poisoned the lands and Loki will be helpless in his wake, anchored only by the feel of Thor’s hand in his, pulling him along._

 

“Asgard offers to Jotunheim, the Casket of Eternal Winters.” 

 


	2. like I have found you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the first time Loki shows himself to Thor

 

“I want to see.” Loki raises a brow, and then smirks at the heavy intent in Thor’s eyes. He makes to drop Thor’s cloak, borrowed only for the sole purpose of provoking Thor into soiling it, and the texture really does feel wonderful on his cock, but Loki supposes it’s his back that will benefit.

_Thor is so dreadfully romantic at times, preferring missionary when Loki can take it, take him in all sorts of positions-_

“I want to see,” Thor says again, with a pleading edge that makes the malice in Loki stir.

 

Loki’s mercurial temper flares. 

 

Loki understands what exactly it is that Thor wishes to behold before him - not his brother, not his lover - but that monster that blue child that Odin picked up from wrecks.

 

“Very well,” He hisses, dropping his playful mood, ignoring the edge of hysteria in his voice. “The almighty Thor wishes to behold the monster of his childhood, far be it for this lowly subject to deny his  _wishes,_ ” and he reaches for that solid block of cold inside him and  _pulls-_

It races across his skin, plunging the temperature of the entire room downwards.

 

“Loki.” Thor gasps, and his image blurs through hot burn of shame in Loki’s eyes.

 

Suddenly furious with both Thor and himself, his rage boiling over and flooding his mouth with a metallic taste because he bit his lower lip hard enough, Loki has had enough of his little games, of his mockery of his scorn -  _how dare Thor look at him this way as though Loki is lesser._

 

Loki explodes into action pinning Thor down, and it’s a pity about his hair, because Loki would love to rip it from his scalp- 

 

Something presses against Loki’s thigh and Loki snarls, scratching down Thor’s arm to prevent him from reaching for Mjolnir-

Wait.

“You cannot be  _serious_ ,” Loki says, incredulous and quite horrified, too shocked to hold onto his anger. Thor groans and covers his face as Loki gropes underneath him, not for any pleasurable purposes but for confirmation in the form of Thor’s very interested member, its heat almost scalding to touch. “You’re attracted to  _this_?”

 

“You’re on top of me!” Thor protests, and Loki narrows his eyes and gives him a warning squeeze that makes Thor wheeze comically. “And naked.” Thor adds, petulantly. “Of course I would react.”

 

“I’m blue. I can’t believe you - are you a lust muddled fool that will fuck everything with two legs-“

 

Thor, who has been looking up and down Loki’s body in that aforementioned lust muddled trance just comments dazedly. “Very blue indeed.”

 

Loki grips Thor’s chin, and forces him to look upwards into Loki’s face. The scar has been healing nicely, but it still remains a dark purple that Idunn’s apples would have-

_The whole grove must have burned-_

 

Invasively, he sends his magic through Thor, checking for any lingering illusions that might have been cast by their sister while absentmindedly doing a check of Thor’s depth perception.

 

Thor yelps when he withdraws it just as forcefully. “Did you just check me for a  _spell_ -“

 

“Seeing that I’m  _worried_ -“ He clamps his traitorous mouth shut on his next words and settles for glaring instead. “It will not do for Asgard to be led by a one-eyed king, let along one that cannot see out of his only eye-“

 

Thor opens his mouth, obviously to give some stupid remark, before his stupid brain catches on Loki’s words and a sly grin, far suited for Loki’s face instead of Thor’s dawns with a cold clench in Loki’s belly. “You were worried?”

 

He rolls his eyes and shoves a hand in Thor’s face, intending to drop the subject, and leave, with his tattered pride. “I’ll sleep in my room t-“

 

“No.” Thor says, and something about the quiet authority in his voice makes Loki pause. 

 

“I beg your pardon?” Loki asks, softly, dangerously, silk folded over the sharp edge of a knife that he could just as easily slip between Thor’s ribs-

 

“Stay,” Thor murmurs, and without breaking Loki’s gaze, he reaches for Loki’s hand and presses it to his own mouth. His beard scraps against Loki’s palm, and then his tongue presses, overly hot and wet.  

 

“You are a dog,” Loki spits out.

 

“A veritable beast.” Thor agrees, and sucks right down one of Loki’s fingers, with just the edge of teeth. _Such childish manipulation does Thor think Loki would fall for it-_

 

“I do hope I give you frost bite.” Loki hisses. He kisses Thor, all sharp teeth and tongue.

 

Thor responds ardently, slipping his arms around Loki and arching his body upwards. It’s strange, because desire with Thor is endless, it takes but a splash of oil for that low simmer that Loki hatefully carries for him to burst into an inferno that devours all rational thought, along with an ugly feeling inside him that he recognises from before-

 

“If it’s a  _monster_  you want,” Purring, Loki allows a sharp grin to spread across his face, just on the edge of too much. “Let me indulge my dear brother. I’ll give you a monster you can  _fuck-”_

“Loki.” 

 

"Should I roll over and let you  _subjugate_  me-"

 

"Loki,  _stop_." With uncharacteristically unprovoked violence, Thor tears away from Loki, pushing him off the bed to stalk to the window. His large frame shakes as he attempts to compose himself, but his gaze is still fixed on Loki. His shaking fists spark.

 

“Brother,” Loki says, low and reminding, hearing the crackle of static.

 

Thor takes a deep breath, and the chips soften, and then fade, the silver light fading from underneath his lid. He still looks deeply unhappy, as though Loki gutting him could not hurt him that much.

 

“I wish you wouldn’t talk about yourself that way,” Thor says. “I saw the play, I thought you accepted-”

 

“Accepted  _what_ ,” Loki hisses, because he has no space for Thor’s ill regarded sympathy-

 

“Accepted yourself,” Thor insists, a rising crescendo to his voice and it chirps once more. “I will—”

 

“ _It is not your burden to bear,_ ” Loki all but screams at him, the old ugly scar dragged out, and he wishes he could skin himself, leave the blue skin on the floor and wear back his ugly but familiar white one, the one Frigga has soothed and Odin had dismissed, anything but this hideous form-  _“It is not yours damn you-”_

 

“It is mine,” Thor says, suddenly soft, and he grabs Loki’s wrist before Loki can drag his nails down his own face. “It is mine, because it is yours, and I will share it, if you let me.”

 

Loki hates him, would rip his throat apart with his teeth, he could do it with his claws-

 

Loki loves him. 

 

“Damn you, Thor, all you and your noble intentions to Hel.” Loki snarls, and leaps forward to tears Thor’s clothes off, his actions wild and desperate. Thor makes a sound, cups his face and presses a kiss to the side of Loki’s mouth. 

 

“Slow down,  _beloved._ ” He murmurs, at odds with Loki’s frantic movements and Loki hates himself too but  _beloved_ \- “I want to see.” 

 

_Beloved,_ Thor called him _, beloved._ Loki’s heart all but stops, for a moment, nothing but that word resounding in his ears like the wash of the Bifrost as he fell, fear a palpable thing in his heart, but beyond that, exhilaration at the thought of finally being free-

 

“Then, feast your eyes.” Loki snaps at him, trying to aggravate Thor, to push this back into the edge of violence and kisses that tastes like blood and mutually inflicted wounds, only for Thor to pull him forward in an embrace. 

 

“I’m sorry, I ever made you think that way,” Thor murmurs, fiercely, and it’s that again, that bit of Thor that Loki loves whole-heartedly, the innate goodness in him. “I’m sorry, brother.”

 

Loki makes a sound of wordless rage, but Thor catches him and holds him to himself, scattering kisses over his face, gentle brushes of his lips until tension seeps away from Loki at Thor’s open affection, until his spine has turned sinuous in Thor’s hands, soft enough for Thor to support it and hold him upwards. He would struggle more, but part of him admits that he was wanted this, someone to look upon him and not feel disgust, when that is all he has to offer himself.

 

“ _Take me to bed,_ ” Loki murmurs, wanting the reassuring bulk of Thor’s body against his own, something to anchor him when he feels as though he is only one step away from turning his mind to malicious paths. Besides, Thor’s use of lightning always lives an intriguing taste on his skin and Loki is intent on feeling the buzz of it like a purr against him.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This is for all the Thor/Loki writers that have kept the love alive.


End file.
